One Death Ruling Halted, One Upheld

TALLAHASSEE -- The Florida Supreme Court on Thursday canceled the death sentence of one Broward County man because of evidence wrongly submitted during his trial and upheld another Broward resident`s date with the electric chair.

The first-degree murder conviction and death sentence given Patrick James Thompson in the 1983 murder of a woman whose body was found in a cardboard stereo box in a Fort Lauderdale dumpster were overturned by the high court and a new trial has been ordered. The court said that the state should not have been allowed to introduce evidence of a previous rape and kidnapping conviction.

Thompson, now 29, was found guilty in the strangulation of Patricia Nigro, 29, who had just moved from Connecticut to South Florida. He was charged a year after the body was found in the dumpster behind the Stadium Pub.

Thompson was accused of killing Nigro, the daughter of a former Connecticut state senator, after stopping to help her with her car, which was stuck in sand. Investigators said he murdered her after she fought off a sexual attack.

Defense attorney Evan Baron said he was ``extremely pleased`` by the high court`s ruling. He said jurors may have been improperly swayed by his client`s previous conviction.

The jury heard the testimony of a woman who was raped and kidnapped in 1981 by Thompson in the same area where Nigro`s body was found.

``I think it prejudiced the jury to the extent that Mr. Thompson didn`t get a fair trial,`` Baron said.

Assistant State Attorney Kelly Hancock, who tried the case, said the prior conviction had been introduced because of the similarity between the two cases.

``I thought it was similar to this case. I guess they (the Supreme Court) concluded it wasn`t similar enough,`` he said.

In the other Broward case, the court upheld the conviction and death sentence of David Gorham, a 29-year-old escaped convict from North Carolina who had been serving a 10-year sentence for burglary. Gorham was found guilty in the slaying of Carl Peterson, a self-employed mechanic whose body was found by police outside a Pompano Beach warehouse.

The court also overturned three death sentences given Terry Van Royal Jr., who was convicted in the execution-style slaying of three men in a Clearwater home. The court said there was insufficient evidence to support the trial judge`s decision to ignore the jury`s recommendation of life imprisonment for Royal and instead invoke the death penalty. The trial court was ordered to impose life prison terms instead.